Square + Pickup Signal
Looking for a Square order-ready screen? Square's own answer is order-ready texts — an SMS when the order's marked done, available on Square for Restaurants Plus and Premium with a KDS device running as an Expeditor. What Square doesn't offer is a customer-facing status board. Pickup Signal is that board: it connects to any Square account and puts the live queue on any TV, no Restaurants plan and no KDS hardware required.
Side by side
| Pickup Signal board | Square order-ready texts | |
|---|---|---|
| What the customer gets | A live screen in the shop: their name under Now making, then Ready | An SMS when the order is marked complete |
| Square plan required | Any Square account | Square for Restaurants Plus or Premium |
| Hardware required | Any TV with a browser, or any cheap HDMI stick | At least one Square KDS device code, with an Expeditor device |
| Needs the customer's phone number | No | Yes, collected at checkout |
| Where it helps | The crowd at the counter asking "is mine ready?" | The customer who wandered off |
| Price | $19.99/month per location, 30 days free, no card | Included with the eligible Restaurants plans and hardware above |
Square requirements as published in Square's support article, July 28, 2026 — check Square's site for current details.
Better together
If you're already on Restaurants Plus with a KDS, order-ready texts reach the customer who left the shop. Nothing about Pickup Signal replaces or interferes with them — the board reads your orders through Square's own integration and never touches your checkout flow.
Most of a boba rush never leaves the counter. The board answers "is mine ready?" for the whole line at once — no phone number collected, no per-message anything, and it's also your shop's name and colours up on a wall. Orders with a pickup ticket arrive by themselves; anything else, staff add in two taps.
Questions
Not as a native product. Square's built-in option is order-ready texts on eligible Square for Restaurants plans with KDS hardware. A pickup screen comes from a partner product — that's what Pickup Signal is.
No. Pickup Signal connects to any Square account through Square's standard authorization — no Restaurants plan, no KDS device, no new hardware at the register.
No, and it doesn't try to. A KDS is a kitchen workflow tool for staff. Pickup Signal is the customer-facing layer — it can run alongside any kitchen setup, including no KDS at all.
Orders that carry a pickup ticket in Square — online orders, app orders, and POS orders rung as pickup — appear with the customer's name and items. For anything else, staff add the order with two taps on the barista page.
Connect Square, pair a TV, hand your staff one link.
Start free30 days free · No credit card · $19.99/month per location